This Never Happened (Olympus Drive Chronicles)

Part 8 - I do not enjoy this

Gale whisks me away. He essentially teleports places as he pleases, which, if you ask me, is a really bad superpower for a kleptomaniac with the worst impulse control ever. Nobody asked me. Anyway. How do I know he's a kleptomaniac? Well, when he starts crying because I have no pockets to be picked, that's a fucking clue.

"What---we're stealing those cattle aren't we?" I ask, very resignedly. For situational awareness, he and I are lying in the grass, gazing at a field in which some nice fancy cows (like the type people keep as pets?? Like not the big black or black and white ones, but kinda fuzzy? I don't know. One more time we are not in this story because I'm smart). The cattle are grazing happily and being happy little fluffy cows. Gale, my half brother, I suppose, is lying next to me, gesturing at them emphatically.

"Why? What is it with you and cows? These look expensive. Why do you want these cows?" I ask.

"Because---because----because they---because ----because they ---they do not----do not belong to me. Therefore----there----therefore.  I want---I want them," he struggles to get it out, face going red with the effort of it, brow knitted into a frown.

"Is that like your motto or something?" I ask, very tiredly.

He nods really hard, happy I understand him.

"Shit, okay fine, what are we going to do?" I ask, well aware I'm not gonna talk him out of this.

He points emphatically to the cows.

"Okay fine. you lead," I sigh.

And it is while we are army crawling across a cow pasture (10/10 do NOT recommend for reasons that are obvious to everyone but the red-headed serial cow thief), as I mumble about never going places with any of my brothers ever again, that I am caught. In a net. I mean, it's a pretty cool red-headed-serial-cow-thief trap, and I would be impressed if I weren't trussed up in it.

"Ha! Gotcha! Filthy little ingrate," the owner of the net is pleased.

"Look, I'm sorry! I don't have an explanation, but I am sorry," I say.

Gale hisses and makes rude gestures, wiggling in the net.

"Teaches you to go touching my cattle---all right, inside with the pair of you," the speaker is a man, maybe my age ish? (I realize I describe everyone as my age, that's because I don't know how old I am. We'll go on). He looks---kind of like that guy who wrote Hamilton (what? It was Delia's favorite. I slept through it often), with shoulder length nut brown hair, of some indeterminate race, and a sly grin that it's hard to be annoyed with. I'm sure that dude is very nice in his person. This dude I was not a fan of based solely off him catching us in nets, but that was about to be confirmed.

The man drags us up to a porch. But that sentence does not at all encompass the experience. So. Let me elaborate.

My half brother Gale? Yeah him. I don't think I've fully described him for you. He has brown and green eyes that are tipped such that it's extremely obvious he's coming up with bad ideas. He doesn't speak, but he doesn't need to. To be safe he just tends to wear a 'who me' expression because he's constantly doing something to be accused of. He's a little shorter than me, but packed solid with muscle and rage.

We were in a net together.

Now I don't know, if, based off of your life experiences, you are generally acquainted with the physicality, ferocity, and habits of small evil forest dwelling creatures such as raccoons, badgers, and wasps. But if you are, then imagine if one were packed into something resembling a person suit, and got stuck in a net with a six foot two dumb undead body builder.

No, I did not have a good time at all. Yes, our net experience lasted about twenty five seconds, but you need to know how traumatic this was for me. By some miracle he didn't claw my eyes out. A few more minutes and he probably would have started feeding on me.